Why were the Grateful Dead banned from performing live?
The Grateful Dead might have loved performing live more than any other aspect of their gig as the longest-running psychedelic band to emerge from the 1960s. However, their seemingly never-ending cycle of touring was jeopardised towards the late 1980s, as many prominent live venues began to ban the group from performing.
First, there was an issue with the 15,000-seater arena Boston Garden in 1982. That was the band’s own fault, as venue officials found its members grilling lobsters on the fire escape of the arena before the show started.
But what followed was a spate of bans enforced by venues and local authorities across the United States between 1988 and 1990. These venues included the Ventura County Fair in California, which led fans to petition against the ban en masse two weeks after it was announced in April 1988.
Then there was the Dead’s traditional California campus circuit, with California State University, Stanford and Berkeley all imposing bans. In addition to that, Irvine Meadows in Orange County and Merriweather Post Pavilion in Howard, Maryland, and the band faced dozens of cancelled performances at some of its most popular venues. It seemed as though the main issue was the group’s fans: the Deadheads.
Who were the Deadheads?
As the Dead became one of the most successful rock bands in the world. “Deadheads”, or “Dead Freaks” as they were known in the early days, were one of the most imposing fanbases in town. And they went to every town.
The group’s fans were known for not just following the group as one might today, by buying records and merchandise, but they actually followed them. Tours would be littered with familiar faces as Deadheads found themselves on the road as the band itself, following them from show to show.
Jerry Garcia was aware of the band’s diehard fans. “Well, it’s obviously very important to them. And more than that, it’s giving them an adventure,” Garcia observed about the most devoted Deadheads in a 1980 interview with Relix. “They have stories to tell. Like, ‘Remember that time we had to go all the way to Colorado, and we had to hitchhike the last 400 miles because the VW broke down in Kansas.’ Or something like that. Y’know what I mean? That’s giving them a whole common group of experiences which they can talk about.”
“For a lot of people, going to Grateful Dead concerts is like bumping into a bunch of old friends. There’s a vast network of Deadheads,” Garcia revealed. “They’re kind of like people who have come to know and recognize each other, and it’s like support. Sometimes a person can find a ride across the country with a Deadhead, or stay over at somebody’s house, or any of that. So, that seems to function pretty well for them.”
So, what caused the bans?
The widespread imposition of bans against Grateful Dead performances followed an explosion in the group’s popularity after the release of their 1987 single ‘Touch of Grey’, which became their first-ever hit single. Seasoned Deadheads were suddenly joined at shows by a whole new generation of devotees, and many of the band’s traditional venues could no longer handle the subsequent increases in attendance.
What’s more, the new crowd proved to be even rowdier than old-school Deadheads, with a proliferation of drug-related disturbances reported at concerts. The famous “Shakedown Street” of market stalls selling psychoactive that fans set up outside venues became an overwhelming sprawl that police and gig organisers could no longer control.
In the summer of 1990, three deaths related to the drug LSD were reported at shows by the Dead. Things were so bad that Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir and co began distributing the following message to their fans on leaflets outside their shows, they read:
“A Grateful Dead concert is for music, not for drug dealing. The problems we are experiencing mostly have to do with drug dealing outside our shows — it’s the most visible, high-profile reason for anybody to have a problem with us. In other words, dealing makes us a target — so please don’t buy or sell drugs at any of our shows. We’re not the police, but if you care about this scene, you’ll end this type of behaviour so the authorities will have no reason to shut us down. We’re in this together — so thanks.”
It seems that this warning was heading, and things began to calm down a bit in 1991. That was the same year the Dead were allowed back to Boston Garden for the first time since their ban. And they enjoyed a relatively trouble-free time of it during their final four years on the road. You don’t rack up 2,300 shows by getting banned for good, after all.
